


If I Just Save You, You Could Save Me Too

by Decaykid



Category: Avengers Arena, Dark Wolverine (Comics), Marvel, X-23 (Comic), X-Force (Comics)
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Self-Harm, Sibling Bonding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-18
Updated: 2015-01-18
Packaged: 2018-03-08 00:44:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,699
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3189413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Decaykid/pseuds/Decaykid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When her inner demons come out to play, Laura finds the last person she'd expect sitting at her side.</p>
            </blockquote>





	If I Just Save You, You Could Save Me Too

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is about two years old and was written before I had a proper grasp of the comics' timeline, so I'm not quite sure when it's set. 
> 
> Title taken from a You Me At Six song.

The cold ceramic presses against her lower back. She takes slow deep breaths, trying to calm herself. The first incision is already closing. She makes a new one, cutting her flesh with an angry fervor she didn't intend. The blood trickles down her arm, dripping into the floor. The crimson stands out, bright and angry against the white tiles of the bathroom floor, much like the anger burning in her chest.

Things are all wrong. Somewhere along the way, she must've miscalculated. Overestimated something, or maybe didn't pay a certain detail enough attention. She should've known better. She should've realized that things weren't going to change. She isn't really sure what she had been expecting when Wolverine, the man she's cloned after, came into her life. Redemption? A new life? A family? She can understand his standoffishness with her. She's a weapon, and he's cautious. Most people are, around her. She can understand him being weirded out by the fact she's his clone. But then he asked if she wanted to be adopted, and things started to look up, things started to change.

Or so she thought. She makes another angry gash in her forearm. She had been so foolish. He never came through, and she can even understand that. But now, now he's using her. Dragging her into his mess, his problems. And he knows better. He knows what it's like to be viewed as nothing but a weapon, he knows how it feels to be extorted. And yet, he's doing it to her.

_"You told me to make my own life. I did. I chose not to be apart of your own feud with Cyclops, yet you are asking me to join a fight I do not want to be a part of."_

_"I know, X. But it's what we are. It's what we do."_

We, there is no 'we', there never was. Only Wolverine and his 'vision' for her. And there's Gambit. Gambit, who knows what's going on, who swears up and down that Wolverine doesn't mean it, _'he's just not good at expressing himself, petite,'_ Laura knows she's not an expert in human emotions and communications, but she knows when someone is using her to do their dirty work.

She had sacrificed her friends, her free time, her being for him. All he was criticize her performance, then asked if she can do it again a few days later.

Unless...

She fights back angry tears. What if she really is nothing but a weapon, a killing machine, a copy... 23rd to be exact. What if no matter how hard she tries, she will never be anything else? More blood drips to the floor.

Nothing makes sense to her, and she doesn't know where to go for help. She's abandoned her friends to help out on a secret missions, Jubilee is always off doing her own thing, and Gambit's too busy either fighting with or fucking Rogue when he's not teaching classes to pay her any attention.

"Laura...?" The door knob jingles. Her lips pull over her teeth, but she makes no audible sounds. When Daken had come to the mansion a few short months ago, she had opted that they dorm together, that way she could keep an eye on him, since Wolverine is hardly ever around. Gambit had protested, but everyone else agreed that it'd be for the better safety of everyone. From time to time she wonders why she opened her mouth.

"Laura..." His voice is more stern now, and she doesn't bother to try to hide anything as she hears an odd popping sound. Tears mix with the blood on the floor before Daken even fully enters the room.

"Go ahead," she chokes out between sobs, "tell me how weak I am, how foolish I am for trusting these people. Tell me what a monster I am, how freaky and inhuman I am. Tell me everything I've heard before."

He crouches down in front of her, cupping her chin with his hands.

"Don't listen to anything they say, Laura. They can never understand."

"And you do? What makes you any different then them?" Tears continue to fall from her eyes, running in glistening trails down her cheeks, down Daken's hand though he doesn't movie it. He gives her a small smile, and she wonders if all his smiles look either like a sneer or a smirk, but this one lacks its normal bravado. There's a hint of sadness there, and it looks all wrong on him.

"Laura, I don't mean to sound like an old man, but you're only seventeen. I have lived your life four times over and I can tell you it doesn't get any easier." She shuts her eyes, trying to will the tears to stop.

"everyone has a moment of weakness, Laura. Everyone has a vice." The tone of his voice has changed, and it doesn't sound like Daken. It doesn't fit with the stories Wolverine has told her, it doesn't fit the things Gambit and Jubilee tell her, and it doesn't fit the whispers in the hall.

"If you didn't cut yourself, then you'd just find another outlet for the stress. You'd end up drinking, just like him. You'd be fucking everyone on site, or maybe killing them, just for that release. Or worse, you could end up devoting your life to vengeance that just leaves you as empty in the end."

She looks down at him, searching, surprised, but his eyes are downcast. Then she understands. They are more like each other than they realize. Both are lost, empty and alone. Both are products of their past, with nothing left in their future. Both have been tossed aside, forgotten, more times then they'd like to count by people they thought they could trust.

He reaches up, gently wiping her tears away before taking her wrists, being carefully of the still-healing cuts. He tugs at them, but she doesn't budge from her spot beside the bath tub. Instead, she stares down at him hesitantly.

"C'mon Laura, don't look at me that way. Don't you trust me?" he gives her his trademark smirk of overconfidence, but it quickly falters when she doesn't oblige. She doesn't want to answer the question. The man sitting before her is the last person on Earth that she should be trusting... but then again, the ones she thought she could trust have all left her behind, moving ahead in their world, too wrapped up in their personal affairs to have the time for her.

It's not Wolverine sitting in front of her on the bathroom floor telling her the things she wants to hear. It's not Gambit who busted the door open to see if she's alright and it's not Jubilee, or Hellion who moves down on the floor beside her to wrap an arm around her shoulders.

It's Daken.

Daken, the Dark Wolverine.

Daken, the estranged bastard son of Wolverine.

Daken, the master manipulator, Madripoor crime lord, power hungry sociopath, the tails-end of their two sided coin. he frowns; maybe she shouldn't be here. Maybe she should just get up, and go confess to Gambit. Give Wolverine a call and tell him she's done it again. They'd stop everything they're doing and come help her, and she'd see she was merely being paranoid and selfish.

"I don't want to hurt you, Laura. You seem to be doing a fine job of that yourself. If I wanted to kill you, I would've done it in Madripoor." She stiffens at his words.

"Why did you come into the room?" she asks, words harsh. She can't be sure that he isn't manipulating her. Although she's sure he hasn't been using her pheromones, she would've picked up on their scent.

"I wanted to join your pity party."

"Daken..."

"I could smell your blood through the door. Not to mention the distress. The air was thick with it. I wouldn't be surprised if the others could smell it." She elbows him in the ribs and he chuckles. They sit in silence for a few moments.

"The bathroom's a mess," Daken says observationally. Laura looks around. There's pools of her blood on the ground, the doorknob is in pieces next to the entrance. He unwraps his arm, standing up and for a moment Laura mourns the loss of the warmth but she quickly tries to dismiss the thought as Daken holds his hand out for her. She takes it, and pulls her up with ease.

As she washes her hands and forearms in the sink, Daken takes care of the mess on the floor. Now that it's all over with, she feels guilty and ashamed. Although Daken seems unperturbed by the whole event, which makes her feel a little more at ease. A few minutes later they're both sitting on Daken's bed, Laura's lost in thought while he assesses the damage of the doorknob.

"Ugh, I really don't think this is salvageable." Laura turns her attention to Daken. She can see where his claw had entered before cutting the thing up from the inside out. "You should probably get to sleep, bozu. You've had an... interesting evening." She stands, making her way to her bed before pausing.

"Daken?" She asks, keeping her back to him.

"Hmmm?" She hesitates. She's fully aware of what Daken is capable of. She knows there are other ways to manipulate people besides pheromones. She knows she doesn't have a lot of understanding of people and emotions and interactions. But she does know what it's like to be lonely, to be an outcast. She knows what it's like, to wonder if there's more than this. She knows that sometimes in life, you have to take risks. Sometimes it pays off, sometimes it doesn't.

"Thank you." She moves before she can talk herself out of it and wraps her slender arms around him, pulling him into a hug and he hesitantly returns the embrace. For once, something actually feels right and she wonders if this is what 'normal' feels like. She wonders if this is how 'family' and 'love' and 'trust' feels like. For a moment, she feels whole, she feels indestructible. She feels real.

**Author's Note:**

> Bozu to my understanding is an informal term for 'kid', and is kinda like saying "Hey squirt."


End file.
